NVIDIA now prohibits partners to ship GeForce cards to server and HPC clients

In an effort to boost the sales of its more lucrative Quadro and Tesla cards, NVIDIA recently instructed its distribution partners to no longer sell GeForce graphics cards to clients in the server and high-performance computing (HPC) markets.

NVIDIA is clamping down on this practice to boost the sales of its higher-margin cards. DigiTimes reports players in the server and HPC market have been using GeForce cards for their products to help customers save costs. The GPU designer hopes the stricter attitude will result in more sales of its Quadro workstation card and its Tesla server cards.

Distributors who don't play by NVIDIA's rules will be at risk of seeing their supply cut:

Most distributors are expected to stick to the requirement since violating the rule may result in reduced graphics card supplies from Nvidia. HPC and server players are concerned that the new move could lead to increased risks as equipping Quadro and Tesla series graphics cards will significantly raise the end-products' prices.

Players that have both server and graphics card businesses such as Asustek Computer, Micro-Star International (MSI) and Gigabyte Technology are also expected to be strictly monitored by Nvidia, said the sources.